Pat Bertram has written much about grief in the eight years since the death of her life mate/soul mate. All her grief blog posts are listed here: Bertram's Blog. The posts are from oldest to newest, so you can follow Pat's grief journey in sequence. Pat Bertram has also written Grief: The Great Yearning, a memoir about her first year of grief, and Unfinished, a novel about a widow who discovers that her beloved husband had many secrets.

Grief: The Great Yearning is not a how-to but a how-done, a compilation of letters, blog posts, and journal entries Pat Bertram wrote while struggling to survive her first year of grief. This is an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.

People need to hear real stories, like Pat Bertram’s. They need to know that others have felt the all encompassing agony—that there is not something ‘wrong’ with them. They need to know they will eventually stop wailing but only if they allow themselves to wail in the first place. They need to know that sobbing over their loss is an indication of their love and their missing, not a cause for psychiatric diagnosis. And they need to see that the only way of healing is to allow the pain expression despite all the forces discouraging this. They need to know they will be okay . . . it’ll take some time, though. --Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS, GDAT, Emotional/mental health therapist and Educator

While sorting through her deceased husband’s effects, Amanda is shocked to discover a gun and the photo of an unknown girl who resembles their daughter. After dedicating her life to David and his vocation as a pastor, the evidence that her devout husband kept secrets devastates Amanda.

But Amanda has secrets of her own.

During David’s long illness and withdrawal from life, Amanda found solace in the virtual arms of Sam Priestly, a college professor she met in an online support group for cancer caregivers. Amanda believed she and Sam would find comfort in each other’s arms for real after their spouse’s deaths, but miraculously, Sam’s wife survives the cancer that killed David. Rocked by unimaginable grief for her husband, confused by her love for Sam and his desire to continue their affair, and at odds with her only daughter, Amanda struggles to solve the many mysteries of her unfinished life: the truth of her husband’s secrets, the enigmatic power of love and loss, and the necessity of living despite the nearness of death.